Best PHP Framework for Mobile Web Apps

Not for 'how-to' coding questions but PHP theory instead, this forum is here for those of us who wish to learn about design aspects of programming with PHP.

Moderator: General Moderators

Post Reply
User avatar
JNettles
Forum Contributor
Posts: 228
Joined: Mon Oct 05, 2009 4:09 pm

Best PHP Framework for Mobile Web Apps

Post by JNettles »

I've been pondering pushing into mobile web app creation with PHP (since I've been having trouble grasping Obj-C for building iPhone apps :wink: ) and while I've been able to create simple web apps using plain old HTML, CSS, and PHP there's just a certain something lacking. For one thing, I absolutely hate it when a supposed web app involves a screen refresh. In my mind, well built web apps should behave almost as well as the compiled apps that live on the device. They should be fast, sleek, and AJAXed.

The fast part brings me to my next point - while we can get away with running massive frameworks that take several seconds to render, trying to pull this off is a death knell for your web app (especially if its not an AJAX call). In my experience anything longer than five seconds is a deal-breaker. Worse, loading an entire javascript framework like jQuery or MooTools is probably not a wise choice - they're heavy frameworks and are expensive to process on limited-speed devices.

So I guess my question is: what would you consider to be the best framework for development in this situation? A few people have told me that we just shouldn't use a framework, period, but I find that over the top - is it time for a super lightweight PHP framework specifically geared for mobile web app design?

Thoughts?
User avatar
Eran
DevNet Master
Posts: 3549
Joined: Fri Jan 18, 2008 12:36 am
Location: Israel, ME

Re: Best PHP Framework for Mobile Web Apps

Post by Eran »

What's the relation between a PHP library and mobile consumption? PHP processing occurs on the server and the client is oblivious to the actual inner workings.

As an aside, I have the opposite opinion from you - a web application is NOT a desktop application and has different UI conventions, and AJAX should only be used to enhance the UI, not replace the hyperlink structure (with page refreshes) users are accustomed to.
User avatar
JNettles
Forum Contributor
Posts: 228
Joined: Mon Oct 05, 2009 4:09 pm

Re: Best PHP Framework for Mobile Web Apps

Post by JNettles »

I'm not speaking about web-page browsing on your mobile device - I'm talking about web apps, like those for the iPhone that try to mimic the look, feel, and behavior of compiled apps.

I'm referring more to a lightweight framework (fast on the server) for easy development of AJAX apps that don't require massive Javascript libraries (fast on the client). Sorry if I'm not communicating this very well but its late. :roll:
User avatar
Christopher
Site Administrator
Posts: 13596
Joined: Wed Aug 25, 2004 7:54 pm
Location: New York, NY, US

Re: Best PHP Framework for Mobile Web Apps

Post by Christopher »

My understanding of webapps is that they are built with Xcode just like any iPhone app.
(#10850)
User avatar
inghamn
Forum Contributor
Posts: 174
Joined: Mon Apr 16, 2007 10:33 am
Location: Bloomington, IN, USA

Re: Best PHP Framework for Mobile Web Apps

Post by inghamn »

These web apps need data, an iPhone app (or webapp) without dyamic data is kinda pointless. (Although, the flashlight is kinda cool, I guess)

If you're building these services in PHP, frameworks can certainly save you time.

As far as the clients-side goes....if you're building an iPhone web app using XCode, you're using Apple's own framework for doing so. For webapps, the XCode ide is just creating HTML, CSS, and Javasscript, and saving them as static files to be put up on a webserver somewhere.
Masakkali
Forum Newbie
Posts: 1
Joined: Thu Jun 20, 2013 2:59 pm

Re: Best PHP Framework for Mobile Web Apps

Post by Masakkali »

inghamn wrote:These web apps need data, an iPhone app (or webapp) without dyamic data is kinda pointless. (Although, the flashlight is kinda cool, I guess
You are absolutely right. These kinds of web apps need data, we can simply use any flashlight app for this.
Post Reply